Rural Payments Agency has paid out more than £919m in single farm payments

The Rural Payments Agency has managed to pay out £919m – close to 60% – of its single farm payment fund, DEFRA secretary David Miliband has revealed.

In a written statement to the House of Commons he said that in the past week 43,270 farmers in England have received a partial payment worth a total of £633m. This means that a total of 83,967 claimants have now received some or all of their money.

The RPA estimates its total single farm payment fund is £1.54bn and its customer base at 109,000.

Mr Miliband said the RPA would now resume full payments and begin top-ups where a partial payment had already been made.

“The claims that have yet to receive a full payment tend to be the more complex and require greater manual processing by RPA staff,” he said.

“Along with the fact that, in some cases, action on 2005 claims will need to be completed first, this presents continuing challenges for the RPA as it works towards meeting its target of making  96.14% of valid 2006 claims (by value) by 30 June.  

“This means that while I would expect a steady flow of payments over the coming months, the pace will vary from week to week.”

Reg Haydon, chairman of the Tenant Farmers Association, said: “It is encouraging to see a big improvement in the performance of the payments division of the RPA compared with last year.

“The forecasts made by the minister last year appear to be on target.”

Position on 2005 payments:

  • There are 87 SPS claims waiting for a payment
  • There are 92 claimants waiting for a top-up payment.
  • Adjustments have been made for another 8000 claimants and there are another 25,000 cases under review because of over or underpayments.

For more on SFP issues see our Single Farm Payment Special Report.




 

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Q If your partial payment is much lower than you were expecting, you should write a letter explaining why and send it to RPA, PO Box 1058, Newcastle-upon-Tyne NE99 4YQ. Include your SBI number and business name and head the letter “Partial Payment”.

Q You can find answers to other partial payment questions at www.tiny.cc/rpaanswers

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